It took a while to finish all the posts about India, but now it’s finally concluded. Here’s the course of my trip plotted on a Lonely Planet map. Following are the India posts about my 24 days around India: India - day 1 - landing in Mumbai - Colaba and Fort Area India - Day 1 and 2 - Pune India - Day 3 morning - A weird encounter at Panaji India - Day 3 - Panaji and Old Goa India - day 4-5 : Goa - Candolim beach India - day 5 - Anjuna …

India was an adventure, and I had some good times, but I think that looking back the one thing that I really appreciate about this trip is having the opportunity to spend some quality time with my father. We didn’t really have a chance to do it this often, and now that we don’t see each other alot, it made the India visit special. I think that the fact we made it in good moods through the rough Indian challenges makes us pretty good travel partners. Anyways, here are all the close-up photos we took together during the trip.   …

Last days of the trip I spent rediscovering Mumbai, which I kind of ran away from in my first day in India, hoping to catch a more relaxing country-side beach-side chillout. To get a good overview of Mumbai, my dad resulted to having a private tour-guide join us, who thankfully was English fluent and quite friendly and helpful in meeting our strange requests. We started our day at the northern outskirts of Mumbai, visiting some of the local churches, sea-side views and local dirt-museums.      …

From Bangalore, our final stop before heading back to Mumbai was Cochin. My dad was hoping to spend a quiet weekend where there’s somesort of a Jewish community, and Cochin certainly has the longest history of a Jewish community anywhere in India with the tourist attraction “Jew-town” (a name I feel utterly uncomfortable with, bringing up Holocaust connotations). To further enrich our Christ College experience at Bangalore we talked to this lovely Indian woman on the phone who owns a homestay option in Cochin and her driver picked us up from the airport. The house was gorgeous, British colonial style, lots of space, expensive looking furniture and design. …

Bangalore, as a general example of southern Indian cities, is a reminder that India can be different. More modern than Mumbai, more open than Delhi, cleaner than any of the other cities, Bangalore was a refreshing look at big Indian cities. Boys and girls holding hands, the ladies dressing up with cleavage, and all in-general looking a lot livelier and happier, it made me think that if there’s one place in India I can ever think about staying for long, it’s probably going to be the southern area. The first day, off the airport, we spent chilling out in the Mahatma Gandi Rd shopping and restaurant area, also visiting the nearby Bangalore parks. …

Udaipur has great potential - with two lakes in the middle of town that almost looks picture perfect. Some day, when the Indians decide they want to clean up the lakes, it’s going to be a great city to live in.    But right now, hate to spoil it to you, there are some serious problems with the lake water, something that has sadly proven an issue all over India. What’s most shocking, or sad, is seeing the locals do everything with that water, from washing clothes to bathing and the occasional teeth brushing. It made me want to …